No Sign of Life
by atrosie
Summary: “What, are you afraid of a few ghosts, Booth?” CBP2 challenge response.


Title: No Sign of Life

Author: atrosie

Rating: PG-13/T

Spoilers: Any and all. Nothing specific, though.

Summary: "What, are you afraid of a few ghosts, Booth?" CBP2

Disclaimer: I own nothing Bones-related.

A/N: Thanks to Firefly and Sue-Sue for the beta.

"Fear is that little darkroom where negatives are developed." – Michael Pritchard

_October 31st_

Temperance Brennan watched as the young man from the coroner's office loaded up his van. The box contained a pitiful amount of remains, and while she would be able to determine age and sex, cause of death and an actual identity would be nearly impossible. It happened sometimes, but that didn't mean she had to like it.

Turning from the scene, she glanced around the woods. The cold Colorado air had her crossing her arms over her chest and shivering, and she was about to give up and retrieve her coat from their rental when something caught her eye. A small red flag dangled from the porch of a surprisingly large and dilapidated house, looking completely out of place – it was in perfect shape, no visible tatters or anything. The flag fluttered suddenly, almost as if it knew she was watching, and she suppressed another shiver that had nothing to do with the cold.

"Everything's loaded up and ready to go, Dr. Brennan," the young man said, and she jumped before turning back to him. He nodded at the house. "I used to hang out there when I was young, you know. All those old abandoned places – they were summer houses for the rich, way back when. They were fun to play in, all falling apart and stuff. Never knew when you were gonna fall right through the floor and end up on your ass in the basement." He grinned foolishly, then glanced at the house again. "That one, though – that place was creepy. Always had that feeling of being watched, you know? We tried to hold a séance there one year on Halloween, but someone was murdered there the day before and they closed the place off. Everyone really thought it was haunted after that, refused to go near the place."

_Haunted, huh?_ Tempe grinned and glanced at Booth, chatting near the sheriff's Tahoe with a few of the deputies. By the looks of things, they were exchanging war stories, and when he caught her eye and gave her a sheepish grin, she just glared back.

It was no secret that she was pissed, being forced to go to Colorado in October when she was supposed to be in Florida at a forensics conference, and while she knew he was trying to make it up to her, she was also secretly thinking of ways to make him pay. He owed her, dammit, and she intended to collect.

"They tore down most of those old places and built fancy new houses instead, but I guess that one's still standing. Never seen that flag before, though. Weird, huh?"

She hoped she made an appropriate response as she walked away, but she probably didn't, and she didn't much care. She had plans now for her afternoon, and they included Booth and a potentially haunted house.

Not that she believed in ghosts. She secretly hoped, of course, but she knew that spirits of the dead weren't floating around, knocking things off shelves and turning on TVs and appearing to people they were related to. She figured Booth believed in them, though. After all, he believed in souls and saints and God, so why not ghosts?

She caught his eye as she walked up to the group and tilted her head, and he nodded and excused himself. "It's not looking good for an ID?" he asked when they were far enough away, and she shook her head.

"Probably no ID, and not a reliable cause of death, either." She kept the irritation and the sadness out of her voice, or so she thought, but he still winced.

"Sorry for making you miss your conference, Bones," and he looked genuinely apologetic, but she waved it away.

"I have a way for you to make it up, Booth."

He raised an eyebrow, understandably nervous. Last time he'd pulled this stunt and had to make up for it, she'd made him spar with her. While he'd clearly won, he'd also ended up with more bruises than he'd needed, and he wasn't eager to repeat the experience.

"Come explore a supposedly haunted house with me," she said, grinning, and he immediately made a face.

"Seriously, Bones? You want to explore a haunted house. Logical, rational, doesn't-believe-in-anything-that-hasn't-been-proven-by-science you?" He snorted. "You're pulling my leg, right?"

"I'm not even touching your leg," she told him, and he rolled his eyes.

"It's a figure of speech, Bones."

"Oh," she said, once again wishing that she'd gotten the manual everyone else in the world seemed to have received.

He stared at her for a minute. "You're serious? You really want to go explore a haunted house on Halloween?" She nodded. "Where is it? Somewhere in Denver? Or that one the guys were talking about that's now a hotel?"

"No, that house over there." She pointed, and he looked at it and then back at her.

"How do you even know it's haunted? That house is more than fifty yards away."

_Really? It seems so much closer._ "The coroner said so," she replied.

He studied her, and she was starting to twitch uncomfortably under his gaze when he finally sighed, and she knew she'd won. "Get your coat out of the car," he told her, nodding towards their rental, "and I'll tell the deputies what we're doing. What explanation do you want me to give them? They're going to think we're crazy, you know."

"Just tell them that I want to disprove a theory and that this seems like a perfect opportunity to do so," she told him, and he rolled his eyes. She grinned and went to retrieve her jacket, grateful for the warmth of the wool and the fuzzy hat Angela had made her pack.

She was waiting on the dirt road when the deputies stopped laughing and let him go, waving like idiots. She rolled her eyes as he came up, and he just shrugged. They headed down the road, snow crunching beneath their feet, and she enjoyed the silence, the easy comfort of just walking with Booth, no conversation required.

Until the creaking of a tree reminded her why they were there, and she glanced up at the house.

"That's odd," she said, and he turned to look at her.

"What's odd?"

She gestured, and he looked at the house, then back at her. "The flag's missing."

"What flag?"

"Exactly."

He gave a long-suffering sigh. "There was a flag there?"

"Yes, a red one, blowing in the wind."

"There is no wind."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "Exactly."

He stared at her for a minute, and after he had turned back and started walking again, she gave a wicked grin and hurried to catch up.

The air around them seemed to get colder the closer they got, but Tempe knew it was merely her imagination. Temperatures wouldn't drop noticeably within a few hundred feet; it was merely the idea that ghosts made everything colder that fueled the thought.

They reached the house and headed up the small walkway, glancing around as they did so. Despite their proximity to the crime scene, Tempe could see no yellow and black tape, no police cars, no cops, nothing. She could barely even see the house; it made her a little nervous, because it made their position seem isolated. She concentrated on the fact that help was closer than it looked, and they had cell phones and guns anyway.

"Stay on the edges of the stairs," Booth warned her as they started up. "Just because the house looks structurally sound doesn't mean it is."

She nodded, holding onto the railing and stepping carefully, but nothing broke beneath her, and they made it safely onto the porch. She looked around, but the red flag was still missing, and the crime scene was still invisible. It was odd, certainly, but not impossible to explain, even though she had no explanation.

Booth raised an eyebrow at her, as if to ask if she was sure, and she smiled. She wasn't the one who believed in spirits of the dead, after all. "What, are you afraid of a few ghosts, Booth?" And she pushed past him and opened the door.

The house was dark and musty, and smelled overwhelmingly like dust, with undertones of dirt, mold, and marijuana, and the very faint stench of decay. Tempe was certain that something had died here recently, but whether it was animal or human, she couldn't say.

Beside her, Booth clicked on his flashlight and handed it over. "The guys gave me an extra one," he explained when she raised an eyebrow. "So we could each have a light, just in case we got separated or something." She nodded and began to explore, Booth right behind her.

The front door opened into a large foyer. The walls were painted a gloomy brown, and the floors were a dark hardwood, covered with a few threadbare, stained rugs. Dust danced in the beams of their flashlights as they traced them over the walls, and Tempe was surprised to see a few pictures here and there.

All of them were black and whites portraits of men and women wearing clothing ranging from the mid-1920s to the early 1950s. From their mostly similar features, she guessed they were family, though without proof she couldn't be sure.

She turned around to get Booth's opinion and screamed. He burst out laughing while she struggled to slow her breathing and heart, and when she had, she whacked his arm. "You ass!"

He lowered the flashlight from beneath his chin, returning his face to its normal appearance, and continued chuckling. "It's a campfire classic, Bones. And we're in a haunted house – it had to be done. And you screamed, Bones. Rational, logical you – you screamed like a girl."

She just rolled her eyes and glared at him. "It was the surprise of the unexpected that made me scream, Booth. I wasn't actually scared. And I am a girl."

It was his turn to roll his eyes and sigh. "Are we exploring or what?"

She followed him through a door and into a living room, complete with rotting entertainment center (no TV) and what must have been a couch, though it had collapsed in on itself and she couldn't be sure. "Where do the ghosts sit, Booth?"

He frowned at her. "Ghosts don't need to sit, Bones. And why are we even here? You don't believe in them."

She shrugged and didn't reply, running her flashlight over the walls. She didn't want to admit that she'd brought him here to prove him wrong, because really, she respected his beliefs and didn't want to malign them. But some small, mean part of her _did_ want to prove him wrong, because that meant she was right, and she liked being right.

"Hey," he said, and she tore her eyes away from the bare walls and focused on him. "There's a record player over here."

"Does it have anything in it?" She asked, crossing the room to look. The record he held out was unlabeled, and she watched as he put it in and adjusted the needle. The record started spinning, but there was no sound. Booth moved the needle back and forth, but all they heard was the gentle _whir_ of the record, nothing else.

"Maybe the wiring's been destroyed," she suggested, and he nodded.

"It's too bad. This is a great player; my grandpa had one just like it." Booth stared at the record player, looking melancholy, then turned and gave her a grin. "Moving on?"

"Moving on," she agreed, leading the way into the kitchen.

The kitchen was large and surprisingly airy, and Tempe imagined that it had once been the pride of the woman in charge. Now, though, the oven and stove top were rusted over, as was the refrigerator, and the tiles and sink were stained. There was definite evidence of animal activity, and in the far corner, there was another picture. She headed over to get a better look.

The black and white photo was similar to the ones in the foyer, but it captured the image of two little girls laughing. Tempe couldn't help a smile of her own at their expressions, and for a brief moment, she heard the faint sound of children's laughter echoing through the kitchen. "Booth?" She turned around.

Booth was gone.

"Booth?" she called again, annoyed that he had left her behind to go exploring. Or, more likely, he was lying in wait, eager to jump out and attempt to scare her with the flashlight again.

"I know what you're planning, Booth, and it's not going to work," she warned him, but the only response was that faint laughter. She shivered.

"Booth?"

Footsteps went by over her head, and while they were too light and quick to be her partner's, she decided that it was, in fact, him, and that she was definitely going up there.

She made a quick trip back to the foyer, where he wasn't, before heading up the stairs.

They were wide, steep, and creaky, and she stayed tucked into the wall, hoping that they wouldn't collapse under her weight.

The hallway at the top had seven doors, three on each side and one at the end. She stepped into the first one on her right, flashlight held ready, and discovered nothing more than a moth-eaten bed with the mattresses missing, a tattered set of curtains, and more animal activity. The first door on the left contained the same.

The second door on the right led to a bathroom in surprisingly good shape. The toilet and the sink were missing, but there was a full-length mirror on one wall and a large, antique claw-foot bathtub next to another. She moved forward, drawn to the tub – she'd always wanted one – and caught sight of her warped image in the mirror. She made a face at her reflection and grinned.

The tub contained about two inches of cold, murky water, and Tempe had no explanation whatsoever as to its existence. There were no holes in the ceiling above the tub, and when she tried the tap, nothing happened. "Odd," she murmured, turning back around.

The laughter again, and suddenly her fun-house reflection was replaced with a crystal-clear image of a little girl. She had blond curls and green eyes, and she smiled when she noticed Tempe, then disappeared.

Tempe stared at the mirror, at the warped counterpart, and shivered. "Booth?" she whispered, expecting no response. None came, just the laughter again, which was quickly moving from cute to creepy.

She left the bathroom in a hurry, thinking _they don't exist, ghosts don't exist. It's just the thoughts put into your head by the coroner and Booth, Tempe. It's just the atmosphere of the abandoned house. Ghosts don't exist, they don't they don't they don't._

And she believed that until she entered the last door on the left.

It was another bedroom, complete with canopy bed and mattress, moth-eaten flowery pink bedspread, tattered curtains and a dollhouse. The dollhouse caught her attention, because while the rest of the house and furniture was in disrepair, the dollhouse was in pristine condition, and it was a perfect replica of the house she was standing in, down to the bathtub with water, the spinning record player with no sound, and the pictures on the foyer walls.

Tempe shivered again, glancing behind her to see if anyone was there. No one was, of course, though she wished desperately for Booth to jump out and yell "gotcha!" She'd even take the laughter and inevitable teasing.

She looked back at the dollhouse and noticed something odd in the attic. Two little girl-dolls were hiding behind some boxes, and there was – there was –

_Her_, a perfect replica, down to her clothes and the flashlight, lying in a growing pool of her own blood.

She swallowed back bile and stared. There was no weapon, no obvious murderer, no motive, nothing. She stepped closer and gagged.

The blood was real.

The laughter again, and words this time. _"Play hide-and-seek with us, Tempe. Upstairs, in the attic."_

"Booth?"

"_Come play with us."_

Echoes of _The Shining_ ran through her head, and her first response was to turn and run, but the stubbornly logical, rational part of her brain insisted that it was all in her head. That ghosts didn't exist, that nothing in that attic could hurt her.

The logic was louder, and she opened the door at the end of the hall and started up the narrow stairs to the attic.

The attic, much like the rest of the house, was dark and musty, and she gripped the flashlight firmly, ready to hit and run if she had to.

A light suddenly clicked on, a single bulb hanging from the ceiling, and she wondered where the electricity came from. For a moment, the part of her that hoped overpowered her rational side, and she was about to turn and run when something caught her eye.

"Who's there?" she demanded, and the creepy laughter was her only reply.

"Hello?" she said, more tentatively, and _something_ appeared. Thinking back later, she wouldn't be able to tell Booth exactly what it was, but it was something. She backed away from it, running the backs of her legs into a bunch of boxes, and lost her balance.

The boxes made for good padding, but the knife beneath didn't, and she was gasping for air when the two little girls appeared.

They laughed, she screamed, and then there was darkness.

* * *

Her back was cold and her head hurt. She didn't want to open her eyes, but she wanted answers, and there was really only one way to get them. She knew she was safe, though; the sounds of the police radios and the scent of Booth's cologne told her that much.

"What happened?" she asked, opening her eyes and carefully sitting up, appreciating Booth's steadying hand on her back.

"It looks like one of the attic floorboards had rotted, and when you stepped on it, it broke. We think you hit your head on the way down, but it doesn't look like you have a concussion," said the coroner. "Although you may have re-fractured your right wrist."

A glance at the wrist in question seemed to support the young man's theory; it was swelling and it hurt, and she knew she'd need x-rays and possibly a cast before they left Colorado.

"And where did you go?" she asked Booth, frowning.

"I found some tools in one of the kitchen drawers," he said. "I was looking at them, wondering if I could fix that record player, and when I turned around, you were gone. I just figured you were exploring, so I messed around with the wiring, and just when the sound came back on, I heard you scream. So I went looking for you, and when I found you in one of the upstairs bedrooms, you were unconscious. So I used my cell and called for help, and here we are."

And here they were, back at the crime scene. She knew she'd never really make sense of everything that had happened, and she'd probably never believe, but some things she just couldn't deny.

"Did you see the girls?" she asked, knowing as she did that it was a stupid question; of course he hadn't seen them. They didn't exist.

"Girls?" he replied, exchanging confused looks with the coroner. "What girls?"

"There were two little girls up there," she began to explain, and he gave her a concerned look.

"Are we sure she doesn't have a concussion, Bill?"

She sighed, and gave up. After all, the girls didn't exist. They didn't lure people into the house, they didn't lead them up to the attic, and they certainly didn't kill them while playing hide-and-seek. They didn't exist.

Booth turned back to talk the coroner, talking about the possibility of a concussion, and she turned to look back at the house.

The small red flag was hanging on the porch, blowing gently in a non-existent wind.

A/N: This fic/challenge response was, like The Noble French Fry's _The Ghosts in the House_, partly inspired by that sixth season episode of the X-Files. But it also came from a variety of horror films I've seen, and my own experiences with the local abandoned summerhouses here in my hometown. Sadly, most of those houses are gone now, torn down to make room for fancier places, and the one that remains (the creepiest one, complete with its own rusty playground) is no longer abandoned.

This was also my first attempt at writing something creepy, and I hope it suffices. Enjoy.


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